Pope has tough sell on materialism in South Korea

Originally published August 15, 2014 at 3:32 am
Updated August 15, 2014 at 5:46 am

Pope Francis called for Catholics to combat the allure of materialism that stifles the spirit Friday during his five-day trip to South Korea. In the newly rich and hyper-competitive country, that might be a hard sell.

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Pope Francis called for Catholics to combat the allure of materialism that stifles the spirit Friday during his five-day trip to South Korea. In the newly rich and hyper-competitive country, that might be a hard sell.

Far from being considered an evil, the trappings of wealth are often linked here to the hard work, sacrifice and gritty persistence of generations who hustled their nation out of war, dictatorship and poverty into an Asian powerhouse.

“I don’t want to knock successful people off their pedestal just because they have a lot of money,” said Kim Eui-kyun, a 61-year-old from Seoul who described himself as a lapsed Catholic. “If someone has made a fortune for himself, fair and square, and has a lot of money, I don’t think that’s something to be condemned. I look up to them, actually, and I wonder, ‘What did I do wrong?'”

Francis made the call during his first public Mass in Asia, receiving a boisterous welcome from tens of thousands of young Asians gathered for a Catholic festival in the central city of Daejeon. During his homily, Francis urged the faithful to reject “inhuman” economic policies that disenfranchise the poor and “the spirit of unbridled competition which generates selfishness and strife.”

It’s a theme he has raised frequently during his pontificate, railing against the “idolatry of money” and the excesses of capitalism that leave the poorest even further on the margins of society. While his message has been met with skepticism among some conservatives in the U.S. who have branded him a Marxist, it has been welcomed in much of the developing world and even some South Koreans said Friday he had a point.

“We are living in the age of limitless competition. But are we truly achieving happiness?” asked Chang Seouk-kyung, a 57-year-old youth counselor. “If such a message is given by someone as powerful and revered as the pope, it will help people wake up, stop and look around them.”

Francis was expected to stress the same message later Friday during a meeting with some 6,000 young Catholics from 23 nations gathered in the sanctuary town of Solmoe, where Korea’s first Catholic priest was born.

Many South Koreans, however, are proud of the national doggedness that has lifted the country from the destruction of the Korean War in the 1950s into Asia’s fourth biggest economy. Competition is a fact of life in a crowded country surrounded by sometimes hostile neighbors, and those who succeed are often lionized. The flip-side, of course, is stress, misery and the rich world’s highest suicide rate.

Francis referred to the toll such competition and stress can cause, saying it can lead to an emptiness that leads to a despair that grows “like a cancer” in society. “Upon how many of our young has this despair taken its toll!” he said.

A glimpse into the country’s complicated relationship with materialism can be seen in the Gangnam neighborhood south of Seoul’s Han River, the epicenter of Korean materialism.

South Korean rapper PSY made Gangnam world famous with his surprise hit video. Luxury cars, clothes, jewelry and a uniform concept of beauty that often comes from a surgeon’s knife are glorified here. Many of the residents became rich almost overnight when a real estate investment frenzy in the early 2000s caused land prices to skyrocket.

There’s envy among many ordinary South Koreans, but there’s also an aspiration to achieve the same things — especially in the realm of in education, which Koreans see as the surest way to climb in a hyper-competitive society.

The students of Gangnam, whose parents shell out big money for prestigious private tutoring and prep schools, are reportedly much more likely to be selected for the country’s most prestigious university than students from less affluent areas.

“That reflects what materialism can do,” Kim, the Seoul resident, said. “Kids can get better education, and they then have a better edge.”

But the breakneck push by South Koreans to modernize and to become rich has a dark side, which can be partly seen in a ferry sinking in April that killed 300 people, mostly high school students. Francis made sure that he reached out to relatives of some of the victims of a disaster has prompted widespread soul-searching over the nation’s neglect of safety as it rapidly developed.

While there’s pride here of the local industrial titans that rival the best companies in the world, the country also has a history of disregard for basic safety practices, including in the ferry industry. The tragedy exposed regulatory failures that appear to have allowed the ferry Sewol to set off with far more cargo than it could safely carry.

Before Mass got under way, Francis met privately with about a dozen survivors of the ferry disaster and relatives of the dead who are demanding a government inquiry into the sinking. One of them, Lee Ho Jin, whose son was killed, asked the pope to baptize him and Francis agreed to perform the ritual on Saturday, said the Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi.

Lee, who has been in catechism classes for two years, participated in a 21-day pilgrimage undertaken by many relatives of the victims, carrying a cross in honor of the slain children from Danwon High School where many of the victims were from to Jindo island, near where the ferry sank. The families gave the cross to the pope, said Hwang Pillkyu, an attorney who is helping the ferry victims’ families.

The relatives also presented the pope with a tiny yellow ribbon, a symbol of support for the ferry victims. The pope took the ribbon and wore it on his robe during the Mass.

In his final prayer, Francis offered words of comfort to survivors and families. “May the Lord welcome the dead into his peace, console those who mourn and continue to sustain those who so generously came to the aid of their brothers and sisters,” he said. “May this tragic event which has brought all Koreans together in grief confirm their commitment to work together in solidarity for the common good.”

Francis arrived in Seoul on Thursday and issued a plea for peace and unity on the war-divided peninsula. North Korea fired three projectiles into the sea just before he landed and another two soon after. On Friday, the North’s official Korean Central News Agency said the rocket test was conducted on the 69th anniversary of Korea’s independence from Japan. It quoted a rocket researcher as dismissing the idea that the tests had anything to do with the pope.